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Summary

• X-Men movies showcase grittier violence compared to MCU, with brutal deaths and darker themes.
• Wolverine's gruesome powers lead to graphic deaths in PG-13 films like Lady Deathstrike's adamantium injection.
• Superheroes like Professor X and Iceman meet brutal ends in haunting and violent ways in Fox's X-Men universe.

The X-Men movies features some pretty gratuitous violence for a largely PG-13 series, with some surprisingly gory deaths scattered throughout its 20-year run. Created in the wake of 2000's X-Men, a one of the earliest examples of a successful superhero team-up movie, Fox's X-Men universe has come a long way. Compared to similar franchises, like the Marvel Cinematic Universe, the world of Fox's mutants is decidedly darker and grittier, with a great deal of disturbing death sequences.
Much of this blood and gore can be attributed to the gruesome powers of the franchise's flagship character, Wolverine, whose claws and powers of rapid regeneration necessitate greater levels of violence to convey. Even though the majority of the films are PG-13, with only Logan and the Deadpool films being rated R, Fox has gotten away with some appallingly brutal kills in the comic book franchise. While the series draws to a close with the premiere of Deadpool & Wolverine, its brutality deserves a spot in the superhero movie hall of fame.
Related Deadpool & Wolverine Story Recap: 12 Things To Know From Previous Marvel Movies & Shows Deadpool & Wolverine is in many ways a love-letter to Fox’s superhero movies, but it also draws notably from the MCU’s most recent developments.
2 10 Stryker Is Chained To A Wall And Drowned X2: X-Men United Close Sergeant William Stryker was undoubtedly one of the most despicable movie X-Men villains ever put on screen. So deep ran his hatred for mutants that he turned his own son into a sort of living weapon, harvesting his DNA to force the submission of other mutants. After all the atrocities he committed, it's hard to feel bad when Stryker is left for dead by Wolverine, with even the promises of restoring Logan's memory not being enough to allow him to live.
After being chained to a wall by Magneto, Stryker is left for dead by Wolverine, not outright killing him but also refusing to help him. He meets his end for good when Jean Grey accidentally collapses a nearby dam, causing him to slowly drown to death while being unable to move. This cruel and callous way to go out was somewhat diminished by the fact that this wouldn't be the last time the series saw Stryker, with a younger version being re-introduced in the prequel timeline.
9 Lady Deathstrike Is Injected With Liquid Adamantium X2: X-Men United Though Lady Deathstrike is an easily forgotten character among the myriad of mutants introduced throughout the franchise, she suffers by far one of the most disturbing fates of any of them in X2: X-Men United. The mutant assassin Yuriko Oyama serves as William Stryker's personal bodyguard, which soon puts her into conflict with none other than Wolverine. Curiously, she seems to have very similar abilities to Logan, including razor-sharp claws on the tip of every finger and a ferocious healing factor that negated physical injury.
Wolverine and Lady Deathstrike's tear-down fight is one of the most violent of any PG-13 movie
Wolverine and Lady Deathstrike's tear-down fight is one of the most violent of any PG-13 movie, the two stabbing each other over and over again to no avail over the remains of the Weapon X program. Faced with an opponent as durable as he is, Wolverine delivers the killing blow by injecting Lady Deathstrike with liquid adamantium, which painfully flows through her body before solidifying, killing her once and for all. This appalling death might be inflicted on a villain, but it is hard to watch, nonetheless.
8 Magneto Kills Sebastian Shaw With A Nazi Coin X-Men: First Class Close The new timeline established by X-Men: First Class introduced audiences to younger versions of both Professor X and Magneto, with the former being more idealistic before his descent into human hatred. A big part of his schism with Charles is their different beliefs as to what to do with Sebastian Shaw, the film's villain and former Nazi tormentor of Erik and his family. Charles abhors the use of violence even against such evil people, but Magneto coldly enacts his other plans for Shaw in the film's climax.
Stunned by Professor X's telepathic powers, Shaw is helplessly trapped in a confined space with his former experimental subject. Cutting himself off from Charles' telepathy with his iconic helmet, Magneto reminds Shaw of his old trials as a child using his mutant powers, in which he was forced to move a Nazi coin. In a cruel ironic execution, Magneto slowly pushes the same coin through Shaw's head, which must've been a terrifying and painful way to go for the former Nazi war criminal.
Related 10 Things No X-Men Movie Can Agree On X-Men"s timeline has long been a wild and confusing mess with several different iterations and retcons throughout, resulting in big discrepancies.
7 Senator Kelly Melts Away X-Men Close The original X-Men film had a decidedly more comic book-y plot compared to later iterations, but the classic superhero romp managed to fit in some existentially terrifying death scenes alongside its cheesiness. At the center of the film is Senator Robert Kelly, a profoundly anti-mutant politician who gains the ire of Magneto's Brotherhood of Mutants. Once again, Magneto and Professor X disagree on how to handle anti-mutant sentiment, and Magneto gets his hands on Senator Kelly.
Using a specialized machine that grants mutant powers, Magneto turns Kelly into that which he hates the most; a common mutant. However, the machine's effects are unpredictable, and Senator Kelly's new mutant powers suddenly manifest in a violent and haunting manner. Kelly ends up turning into a puddle of water, melting away when his body is unable to handle the strain of a sudden mutation, making for a truly disturbing visual amid the otherwise campy first X-Men film.
6 Professor X Is Telepathically Torn To Pieces X-Men: The Last Stand Close Infamous for its poor quality among its peers in the original X-Men trilogy, X-Men: The Last Stand finally killed off many heroic figures. This was all in large thanks to the film's adaptation of the famous Dark Phoenix storyline, in which Jean Grey's powers go out of control under the influence of a latent alternate consciousness within Jean's psyche. Being the only telepath possibly strong enough to stand up to the Phoenix's power, Professor X wearily locks psychic horns with Jean.
Unfortunately, this doesn't turn out well for the X-Men's founder and leader, who is literally disintegrated by the Phoenix's fierce telekinetic powers. Disassembled literally molecule-by-molecule has to be a painful way to go, and brings Professor X's terrible decision to isolate the Phoenix persona in the first place when Jean was still a child full circle. It's worth noting that Professor X isn't the only one to be killed in this manner, though his death is by far the most tragic.
5 Iceman Is Decapitated By Sentinels X-Men: Days of Future Past Close X-Men: Days of Future Past changed the game of the X-Men continuity with its bleak depiction of the future, in which multiple fan-favorite X-Men are killed by an advanced model of Sentinel. Among the dead are Colossus, Sunspot, Warpath, and Blink, who all suffer wince-inducing dismemberments at the hands of the Sentinels. But by far the most gruesome death is that of Bobby Drake, a.k.a. Iceman. Despite being widely understood as one of the X-Men's strongest members, even Iceman isn't tough enough to withstand the sentinels.
Iceman ends up being grabbed by one of the hulking automatons, having his head slowly pulled clean off his shoulders while simultaneously being scorched by a Sentinel imitating Sunspot's fire powers. By using Iceman's crystalline ice form, Fox was able to get away with an shocking amount of "gore", the Sentinel stepping on and shattering Iceman's severed head after killing him. Even if his death was free of blood and guts, there's no denying it must've been tremendously painful.
4 Zeitgeist Falls Into A Woodchipper Deadpool 2 Close One of the funniest jokes in Deadpool 2 was the various horrendous deaths of the short-lived members of the X-Force. Deadpool assembles his team of (mostly) superpowered heroes with high hopes, only for most of them to gently tumble into deadly Final Destination-style accidents shortly after deploying on their first mission. While the scene is played for laughs, it must be admitted that the various deaths of Deadpool's X-Force are among the most brutal in the entire series.
The deaths of Bedlam, Shatterstar, and Vanisher are certainly not pleasant ways to go, being hit by a bus, chopped up by helicopter blades, and fried on an electrical cable, in that order. But Zeitgeist gets a particularly stomach-churning death, gently gliding straight into a woodchipper to be slowly ground to a fine red mist bit-by-bit. As if that weren't bad enough, in his throes of pain, he accidentally uses his power and vomits acid on Peter, melting his arm off and causing his death as well.
3 Dr. Reyes Is Eaten Alive The New Mutants Close The film The New Mutants occupies a strange space in Fox's cinematic X-Men universe. Not only is it tonally quite unique, billing itself as a rare superhero horror story, but its characters are largely removed from the events of all other films, making the narrative stand alone in a lonely, strange story. Regardless, being essentially a horror film featuring mutants, it's no wonder that The New Mutants features one of the most gruesome deaths in the whole franchise.
The film takes a hard left turn when Dani Moonstar, a.k.a. Mirage, ends up accidentally manifesting a giant demonic bear that wreaks havoc on the Dr. Reyes' mysterious hospital. It's Reyes herself that meets one of the film's most grisly fates in the jaws of the demonic bear, being eaten alive by the raging beast. Quite a strange way to die even by X-Men standards, being swallowed whole by a giant creature is still an undeniably brutal death.
2 Donald Pierce Is Tortured By Mutant Kids Logan Close Despite the character's inherently gory power set, Logan was the first genuinely R-rated film to feature the legendary mutant hero. The film certainly didn't hold back with the violence in its action scenes, with both time-honored X-Men and insidious villains meeting their fates in increasingly brutal ways. As far as the latter goes, overarching antagonist Donald Pierce, yet another powerful man exploiting mutants in the series, ends up getting essentially tortured to death by the very mutant children he sought to execute.
Cornered in the woods by Laura and her fellow escapees, Donald Pierce meets his maker when a whopping 18 mutant children combine their powers to give him the most painful death possible. Pierce is first telekinetically forced to the ground before being strangled by plant life, frozen in ice, and then finally electrocuted, making his death a truly tortuous experience. Pierce may have gotten what was coming to him, but there's still a certain sense of unease in watching all the mutant children gleefully participate in the murder.
Related 10 Amazing Costume & Prop Details From The X-Men Movies You Never Noticed The X-Men franchise is notable for its incredibly intricate prop and costume details that reference the franchise’s history and characters.
1 Logan Is Impaled On A Tree Branch And Poisoned Logan Close Of course, it wasn't just the villains who met their disturbing fates in 2017's Logan. The film begins with most of the X-Men being tragically killed, but even Professor X dies in a truly upsetting manner as the movie progresses, being stabbed to death by who he thinks is Wolverine, but in reality is his clone, X-24. That being said, it's Logan himself that finally dies in a particularly brutal and painful way after centuries of being alive, putting an end to his tale in the Fox universe once and for all.
While tragic and painful, this death was Wolverine's perfect swansong in the X-Men movie universe.
Fighting off the lingering effects of adamantium poisoning the entire movie, Logan is in far from ideal fighting shape, with his years in the Weapon X program finally catching up to him, diminishing his healing factor. This explains how he isn't able to come back from such grievous injuries, being ultimately impaled through the chest on a tree branch by X-24 before eventually succumbing to the poisonous mineral coursing through his veins. While tragic and painful, this death was Wolverine's perfect swansong in the X-Men movie universe.
Upcoming Marvel Movies Release Date Deadpool & Wolverine July 26, 2024 Captain America: Brave New World February 14, 2025 Thunderbolts* May 2, 2025 The Fantastic Four July 25, 2025 Blade November 7, 2025 Avengers: The Kang Dynasty May 1, 2026 Avengers: Secret Wars May 7, 2027 X-Men The X-Men franchise, created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby, centers on mutants with extraordinary abilities. Led by the powerful telepath Professor Charles Xavier, they battle discrimination and villainous mutants threatening humanity. The series explores themes of diversity and acceptance through a blend of action, drama, and complex characters, spanning comics, animated series, and blockbuster films.
Movie(s) X-Men (2000) , X2 (2003) , X-Men: The Last Stand (2006) , X-Men Origins: Wolverine (2009) , X-Men: First Class (2011) , The Wolverine (2013) , X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014) , Deadpool (2016) , X-Men: Apocalypse (2016) , Logan (2017) , Deadpool 2 (2018) , Dark Phoenix (2019) , The New Mutants (2020) , Deadpool & Wolverine (2024) TV Show(s) X-Men: Pryde of the X-Men (1989) , X-Men (1992) , X-Men: Evolution (2000) , Wolverine and the X-Men (2008) , Marvel Anime: Wolverine (2011) , Marvel Anime: X-Men (2011) , Legion (2017) , The Gifted (2017) , X-Men '97 (2024) Character(s) Professor X , Cyclops , Iceman , Beast , Angel , Phoenix , Wolverine , Gambit , Rogue , Storm , Jubilee , Morph , Nightcrawler , Havok , Banshee , Colossus , Magneto , Psylocke , Juggernaut , Cable , X-23 Expand